anxious

English

Alternative forms

anctious (obsolete)

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin anxius, from angō (“to cause pain, choke”); akin to Ancient Greek ἄγχω (ánkhō, “to choke”). See anger; angst.

Pronunciation

(UK) IPA^(key): /ˈæŋ(k)ʃəs/
(US) IPA^(key): /ˈæŋ(k).ʃəs/, (with pre-/ŋ/ tensing) /ˈeɪŋ(k).ʃəs/
Audio (US) (file)
Hyphenation: anx‧ious

Adjective

anxious (comparative more anxious or anxiouser, superlative most anxious or anxiousest)

Nervous and worried.
Having a feeling of anxiety or disquietude; extremely concerned, especially about something that will happen in the future or that is unknown.
She was anxious to hear how her test results were.

I could tell she was anxious as she was biting her nails.
- 1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter I, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., , , →OCLC, page 0056:
  Thanks to that penny he had just spent so recklessly [on a newspaper] he would pass a happy hour, taken, for once, out of his anxious, despondent, miserable self. It irritated him shrewdly to know that these moments of respite from carking care would not be shared with his poor wife, with careworn, troubled Ellen.
- 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 19, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:
  Meanwhile Nanny Broome was recovering from her initial panic and seemed anxious to make up for any kudos she might have lost, by exerting her personality to the utmost. She took the policeman's helmet and placed it on a chair, and unfolded his tunic to shake it and fold it up again for him.
- 2012 May 13, Alistair Magowan, “Sunderland 0-1 Man Utd”, in BBC Sport:
  But, with United fans in celebratory mood as it appeared their team might snatch glory, they faced an anxious wait as City equalised in stoppage time.
(of things) Accompanied with, or causing, anxiety; worrying.
anxious labor

There was an anxious wait before the results were revealed.
- 1667, John Milton, “Book VIII”, in Paradise Lost. , London: [Samuel Simmons], , →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: , London: Basil Montagu Pickering , 1873, →OCLC:
  The sweet of life, from which God hath bid dwell far off all anxious cares.
Earnestly desirous.
He is anxious to please, so you can count on him.

All the voters were anxious to hear the election result.
- 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 2, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volumes (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC:
  He sneers alike at those who are anxious to preserve and at those who are eager for reform.

Usage notes

Anxious is followed by for, about, concerning, etc., before the object of solicitude.
Some argue that this word should only be used in the sense of "worried" or "worrisome".